11/4/15

According to Forbes
magazine, the Mets did not quite see the windfall of post-season money that
everyone had expected. They calculated
the return to be about 25% of ticket sales in the home ballpark – good but not
enough to get your hopes up for a big shopping spree this off-season. Throw in the fact that there’s a big loan
payment due in 2016 and you can expect that Sandy Alderson may once again have
to get creative in order to put a decent offense on the field.

Note I said decent
offense. The pitching will be
there. Even the beleaguered bullpen
fresh off the World Series meltdowns has the potential to be solid. The questions, of course, are how to use
whatever funds (and how limited they might be) to build upon the surprising
success of 2015.

First, let’s look at the
departures – 9 in total thus far, including Yoenis Cespedes, Daniel Murphy,
Kelly Johnson, Juan Uribe, Bartolo Colon, Tyler Clippard, Jerry Blevins, Bobby
Parnell and Eric O’Flaherty. Of this
group, I could see them making a run at the former Atlanta Brave bench players
and perhaps a minor league contract offer to Jerry Blevins. The other six are onto their next gig
elsewhere.

The Mets did add various
players onto the 40-man roster today, including people who ended the year on
the 60-day DL. This group includes Zack
Wheeler, Josh Edgin, Rafael Montero, Jack Leathersich, Wilfredo Tovar, Buddy
Carlyle and Darrell Ceciliani. In addition,
there are placeholders not likely to be on the team once personnel additions
need to be made. These players would
include Eric Young, Jr., Kirk Nieuwenhuis, Johnny Monell, Anthony Recker, Eric
Campbell and Jenrry Mejia.

So what is is that the Mets
need going into 2016? Well, for starters
they need to decide their infield alignment.
Will they go with Dilson Herrera at 2B and Wilmer Flores at SS? Flores at 2B and Ruben Tejada at SS? Roll the dice that Gavin Cecchini is ready
for the big leagues already and then decide between Flores and Herrera at 2B? Give Matt Reynolds a look? Hope to get a short term bounce-back price
for Ian Desmond to hold the fort until Cecchini is deemed ready?

Then there’s the
outfield. Everyone is penciling in
Michael Conforto and Curtis Granderson for the two corners, but what about
CF? If Yoenis Cespedes indeed departs,
do you go back to Juan Lagares? Everyone
who’s watched the Mets sees that he’s not the Gold Glove fielder (and
especially not the man with the Golden arm) anymore. Is it a medical issue? If so, why didn’t they address it sooner to
have him ready for 2016?

CF free agent pickings are
pretty slim. Colby Rasmus is available
but he’s another low average, high strikeout guy, not exactly what the team
needs. Denard Span is coming off an
injury plagued year, but he’s been very solid and would give the Mets the high
OBP type of player they’re sorely lacking.
Dexter Fowler is out there and surely the Cubs will let him walk
considering their wealth of young hitters and his outgoing $9.5 million price tag. Gerardo Parra is coming off the best season
of his career, but has played more LF than CF and you would be overpaying for
what could be a statistical outlier.

Another way for the Mets to
improve is the trade route. While they
peddled away a great many pitching prospects last year, they do have some
options. For example, Lucas Duda had a
down year and fizzled when the pressure was on.
Still, another team in a less media-intense town might feel he could DH
or play 1B for them and deliver30 HRs once again.

My answer to replacing him is
Korean free agent Byung-ho Park. He’s
posted absurd
average and home run numbers for the past few years. Even a 25% drop in production would still
energize Queens’ huge Korean fan base and result in a contract likely to pay
for itself. If you doubled the Pirates’
Jyung-Ho Kang’s posting fee and salary, he’d still come in at an average annual
value of about $8 million. That’s Daniel
Murphy money for Yoenis Cespedes production.
You’d have to act fast, though, as he was scheduled to be posted Monday
and offers must be in by Friday.

The other name you might see
in trade rumors is the not-coincidentally moderately expensive Jon Niese. They may opt to go with the best of Logan
Verrett, Carlos Torres, Sean Gilmartin or even Rafael Montero for the 5th
starter slot until Zack Wheeler returns.
Then they can unload Niese’s salary to address problems on the offense
or to pay for the arbitration eligible Addison Reed.

I also agree with a Duda trade, I think Lucas may have outstayed his welcome.

I don't support paying Cespedes into his late 30s. Instead it would be useful to get a proper leadoff speedster CF like Denard Span or Fowler. That would really add something to the Mets' attack. You could in theory then look for a home run monster at 1B. Chris Davis I'm not sure about, a little too one-sided.

I think we need to remember how lucky we were this year with the relative health of our pitching staff. We need to remember the old adage that you can never have enough pitching. I say keep Jon Niese. If you get a great offer, sure, but I don't think we'll get enough back for him to make it worth it.

Would be great if the Mets could stay free of losing draft picks for free agents. In an ideal world. They need to keep restocking!

Trading Duda? depends who the replacement is. I would like the Mets to bring back Uribe at a discounted price, Blevins, again, at a discounted price and see if they can sign Ian Desmond to a 1 year plus club option.

For the life of me I can't understand why the Mets have not tried to fix Lagares once and for all which is just going to create yet another problem for 2016.

Let Herrera and Flores battle for the 2B position if Desmond is signed. If not, Tejada at shortstop and either one from Flores/Herrera for 2B.

I would also send Plawecki for winter games in the Dominican and let him battle for more games with d'Arnaud.

Thinking that the Mets will resign Murphy may be possible but Cespedes is a pipe dream.

@Anonymous -- did you see Park's numbers? .318/.303/.343 the past three years...37/52/53 HRs, 117/124/146 RBIs. I'd say it's time to try a different approach as Duda may have hit his peak here already.